Makeup
by TaintedMoonlight
Summary: Beauty is not attained from mixes of pig fat, dye, and chemical nonsense. Real beauty lies in a certain je ne sais quoi that can only be achieved by being yourself, but maybe it's harder for some people to understand that than it is for her.


**Make-Up**

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**A/N:** I wrote this today and decided to post it up because I love Temari and can't find a good enough fic of just her. I was browsing through the fics of FF and ALL I can find about her are romance fics and very nice family fics, but I couldn't find one that shows just Temari's personality. I couldn't find one with Temari as a person. Temari is the Gaara and Kankurou's sister. Temari is the Kazekage's daughter. Temari is someone's girlfriend. Shoot, Temari is more than just somebody's something else, so I decided to write this. I don't know if it worked out quite as well as I had originally planned, okay scratch that I didn't really plan I just started writing and this was the result. I hope it suit the purpose I intended and I hope you guys like it. Oh and forive me for all the grammatical and/or spelling errors, like I said I decided to write this today and settled on posting it as soon as I finished writing it. I don't normally do that so...it may more errors than usual. Tell me what you think.

And if anyone knows of some Temari fics like the one I mentioned above can you tell me please?

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_So what we don't look the same?  
So what we don't, so what we don't  
So what I don't play your game?  
So what I don't, so what I don't  
So what if I don't?_

_"Misfit" – Amy Studt_

"Temari, let me just—"

The blonde pulled away roughly, "No, Ino!" Her eyes were cold and the look in her eyes was final. "I think I've made myself quite clear."

Ino harrumphed. "Temari, you would look so beautiful with just a little bit of—"

"I don't care." She said coldly, staring at the appliances in the blonde's hands callously. "I don't wear make-up."

Sakura, beside Ino, was looking into the mirror carefully, perfecting her already stupidly perfect hair. "This is exactly why guys don't date you, Temari. How you can expect them to like –"

"What? _Me_? How can I expect them to like me without any of the pathetic chemical obstructions you idiots plaster on your face? How can I expect them to like me when I don't dress like a slut and coo at every fucking word they say? How can I expect them to like me unless I look just like every damn female in this world? How can I expect them to just like me as I am?" She demanded.

"Precisely." The immensely thin blonde said. "Men don't want reality."

"Then I hardly doubt I want men."

Ino laughed throatily.

A laugh Temari knew she had spent hours perfecting in the mirror. The laugh everyone expected a woman to have. The sand kunoichi scowled involuntarily.

"How silly you are, Temari of the sand."

How silly.

_How silly._

They were the ones who worked hard to erase any sense of personality and individuality and _she_ was the one who was silly?

"To exist in this world, you must obtain a decent amount of femininity Temari." A different woman this time. An older one. Temari had never bothered to learn that one's name. Some older kunoichi Ino and Sakura admired. "Just look at you: rash, coarse, blunt, rude, and that appearance of yours." The woman wrinkled her nose. "Eugh."

Temari supposed she could blame this…absurdity – this lack of personality on the influence of women like the one before her, but that would just be an excuse. This absurdity had been festering in the minds of many of them at a young age.

Too many.

She had seen the beginning signs in the small girls.

Now women.

The truth was, too many females strayed down the path of believing they had to be a certain way.

They had to really.

Because it all came down to men and appearances; and the best personality to put forth was that of a plastic, fake, chemically altered, yielding doll.

This was why they were taken advantage of, Temari believed. Because they were willing to let others think of them as dolls. As toys. Things to be played with and then forgotten.

They were pliant women.

'Beautiful' women.

But there was no use telling these women that individuality was a dying trait, one that was more beautiful than anything else.

"There is nothing wrong with me." Temari replied defiantly.

Sakura chuckled.

Another perfect laugh.

Almost mirror image to Ino's before.

"Yes, you are _quite_ the image of perfection." Sakura puckered her lips in the mirror once more, and then turned to face her. "Really, Temari, we are only trying to help you as—"

_Any decent woman would to another. We don't want you making a fool of yourself. We're only trying to care._ She heard this shit before. "All perfect women would." Temari finished for Sakura dryly, her disgust evident.

"Hmph! Fine, suit yourself." The pink haired kunoichi returned her attention to the mirror.

Temari wasn't even sure if any part of them was…real any more. Certainly not their faces with all the chemicals they plastered on, certainly not their smiles or laughter, certainly not their mannerisms, certainly not their acts of kindness.

It was all perfected, pre-meditated, planned out.

The scariest thing was they kept this charade up so long that they _became_ the charade.

Whoever the women before her _used_ to be, were dead. The only thing left was the shell of an empty soul and the mechanic drawling of the perfect woman.

"Just a little lipstick, Te—"

"NO."

"You're going to die a spinster." Ino said coldly.

"I can imagine worse ways to die."

She knew what they thought of her.

She was hopeless.

Pathetic.

Revolting.

Unworthy.

She knew they thought she didn't belong. She didn't fit in their world so they tried to change her.

They tried so hard.

And when they couldn't change her, they hated her.

They wanted to _destroy_ her.

Temari would have welcomed that, because at least she would've known that they were still themselves. But instead they gave her the cold shoulder, turned their noses up at her.

They pushed her out of the secret female inner sanctum.

Hoping this treatment would make her feel so isolated that she was pulled into their secret cult.

She was a threat.

A threat that never caved.

Temari hated their little cult. Hated it with every fiber of her being. She wasn't even _in_ the sect and already what she knew disgusted her, turned her stomach inside out.

She knew Ino ate only once a day, when it was a good day anyway, and even then, what she ate could hardly be considered a meal. Even then, the blonde still decided she needed to throw up the fat she supposedly had.

She knew Sakura slid a needle into her veins daily so she could get a tiny buzz, so she could stay happy. So she could keep up that pretend smile, when inside she was all pain.

She knew Tsunade only drank so she could accept the leers from men without disgust and recoil – looks that didn't fade even after she became Hokage.

She knew Anko's sweet-tooth for sugar wasn't really about the sugar. It was about the little chemical she had mixed in her sweet that made her forget things that had been done to her in the past and things she would let happen to her again; because deep down she craved a physical touch, but it always left her empty and cold.

She knew Shizune didn't keep the pig around because she really liked its company, but because men didn't really want to chase after a woman with a smelly animal as a pet. She'd had her fill of men when she was young and those memories still haunted her.

Temari knew.

And that was only the very brim.

Temari knew no details, but she knew she didn't want to live that life.

She knew she didn't want to hide her face behind a mask of powder and a smile full of lies.

She knew she didn't want to create a defense mechanism to protect her from things she lets happen because she feels that's the way it _has_ to be, because she lets herself become a doll for anyone.

She knows without a doubt that no matter how scorned she feels from the looks those kunoichi give her, no matter how hurt she feels by not having any real female friends, no matter how badly she wishes she could have friendships like they seem to have with each other, no matter how desperately part of her wants to be accepted, she knows she will never do it.

She would never sacrifice who she was, just because of the gnawing bug of loneliness.

She is Temari.

Temari of the Sand.

And she is NOT the same as the rest of them.

And she's proud of it.

Ino's eyes were hollow and so were Sakura's.

"There is no worse way to die."

But Temari knows better.

The worse way, is the way they're living.

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**A/N:** Okay, quick question I want to know if I'm delusional and making up words again (this has happened to me before with words I'm like 99 sure are a real word but I've just made it up) is there a word (if it IS real I could be spelling it wrong) that means like mixed and is spelled somewhat close to "mezcled"? 

And in case anyone cares, the songs I was listening to while writing this (other than the one I already have at the top) are:

_"Stupid Girls" Pink_

_"I Don't Think About It"_ and _"Nothing's Wrong With Me" Emily Osment_

_"Just the Way I Am" Skye Sweetnam_

_"Be Somebody"_ and _"The Hard Way" Fort Minor_

_"Everybody's Fool" Evanescence_


End file.
